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Bank robbery suspect nabbed

An alert Grosse Pointe Farms Public Safety Department officer is credited with getting an armed bank robbery suspect off the streets after the suspect allegedly committed the felony in a neighboring community.

According to a Farms police report, Farms officer Vincent Finn spotted a man who matched the physical and clothing description of a suspect who had robbed the PNC Bank at Mack and Cadieux in Detroit. Finn saw the suspect, a 56-year-old Detroit man, about a mile from the crime scene, on the Detroit side of Mack and Moross, around 5:33 p.m. March 12 — not long after the bank robbery had taken place.

The report indicated that the suspect was pacing in front of a business and manipulating something in his right side pocket. When the officer stopped to speak with the suspect, he asked if the suspect had anything dangerous on him. The report stated that the suspect responded, “A gun.”

Public Safety Director Daniel Jensen said the suspect was behaving suspiciously. The suspect didn’t have a concealed weapons permit that would have allowed him to carry the gun legally, he said.

“Vinny Finn did a great job on that,” Jensen said. “(The suspect) could have easily walked across the street to the (BP) gas station (in Grosse Pointe Farms) and held that up.”

Police recovered the weapon — a loaded 9 mm — and turned the suspect over to a Detroit Police Department car that had been driving in the area. It was not known at press time if the suspect nabbed by the Farms was the same person who robbed the bank, but given the match to the description put out by Detroit police, it’s likely he was responsible for the crime. Even if he wasn’t the right suspect, Farms police said he was still carrying a firearm illegally, a serious offense in its own right.

“(Finn) got a gun-carrying knucklehead off the street. … It was another example of our guys paying attention to what’s going on not only in the Farms, but also in other cities,” Jensen said. “Our goal is to keep crooks out of our city, no matter where they come from.”